A rabbi was rich in wisdom. thus, he was poor in money and crippled with various illnesses of the flesh. he knew he would never marry and bear a child to carry his face and name into the halls of history.

he used his wisdom and learning to build the only child he could: a golem. he fashioned the clay with as close an approximation of the rabbi's face as could be discerned from a mirror.

the golem awoke, left-handed, and odd-looking to the rabbis friends. the golem, you see, looked like the opposite of the rabbi since it had been constructed with help from a mirror. the ears drooped in the wrong way. the sad clay eyes angled differently. the nose was definitely wrong, because noses are hard to carve to inexperienced sculptors. the hands and feet were also clearly off.

the golem was imperfect, then. the rabbi held the imperfect thing back from his heart. the golem, with a lack of love in his life, decided it was high time to find a child to be his own. alas, golems cannot create golems. the golem studied the rabbis tomes, and found nothing to guide his quest for a child. he turned away from holy books to alchemy.

the golem created a homunculus as best as the golem could. the gelatinous bulb took shape from a pool of lamb's blood and wormwood and the stolen hairs and urine of the rabbi - for their had to be a human component to anchor ethereal entities to this plane - the homunculus took the perfect shape of the rabbi.

however, this homunculus had no illness crippling it. the rabbi embraced his grandson and loved it like no other. no joy in life was had by the rabbi that did not involve the homunculus.

the homunculus did not understand this affection. the homunculus looked to his own creator, the sad-eyed golem with the misshapen nose, hands, and feet. the homunculus did not understand why the golem was always so quiet when the rabbi was lavishing gifts upon the homunculus. fine silks. fine clothes.

the golem had worked hard to provide for the poor rabbi. the tireless golem worked day and night to provide for both the homunculus and the rabbi. yet, the rabbi had no praise for the misshapen lump of clay. it was merely a thing to the rabbi - like a toaster that was doing what it had to do without a soul. the homunculus - to the rabbi - was full of sin and wickedness and blood, and all these things were just like what men were full of, and thus the homunculus - to the rabbi - was like a man.

the homunculus felt guilty about this - like any man would. the golem worked hard, and had created a homunculus to warm the stone heart's loneliness.

the homunculus took it upon itself to create a child, too. the homunculus went off to university, and studied hard in the nature's of automata. it got an engineering degree from MIT. it returned home, and commenced work on a replication of the golem: a robot.

when it was completed, the robot opened its eyes, called out for its father, its grandfather, its great-grandfather.

this odd family history shall end soon. i just wish to share one more little detail. the robot, when it came of age, was asked by the rabbi to create a clone of the rabbi that could in time create a golem which would create a homunculus that would create a robot that could clone the rabbi again to create another golem and another homunculus and another robot...

the robot ran away and away and away. it hid among the world of men and hipsters. it was so angry at its fathers. it couldn't explain exactly why it was so angry. it married a woman, and never told her a thing until long after their children were born.